


I’ve Shattered into a Thousand Pieces (We’ll Piece You Back Together Again)

by nickelsandcoats



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Graphic depiction of torture, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-11
Updated: 2012-01-25
Packaged: 2017-10-24 12:26:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 9,232
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/263451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nickelsandcoats/pseuds/nickelsandcoats
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is John Watson, broken.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For [](http://ourdramaqueen.livejournal.com/profile)[**ourdramaqueen**](http://ourdramaqueen.livejournal.com/)'s prompt [here](http://nickelsandcoats.livejournal.com/122267.html) at my shuffle meme post.
> 
> For [](http://ourdramaqueen.livejournal.com/profile)[**ourdramaqueen**](http://ourdramaqueen.livejournal.com/) , who asked for song #69, which was, "Not Broken” by the GooGoo Dolls, from their album _Something for the Rest of Us_. I HIGHLY recommend you listen to this song before you read this story. :)

  
Sarah came down in her dressing gown, pulling it tightly around her. Sherlock was sitting at the kitchen table, eyes glued to the microscope, a mug of tea by his elbow. A second mug, still steaming, was at the opposite end of the table, handle pointed at precisely the right angle for her to pick it up.

She smiled and picked up the mug, wrapping both hands around it as she stared down into it, hypnotized by the swirls the milk made as she gently spun the mug between her hands.

Sherlock broke her reverie with a quiet, “How is he?”

“He’s still sleeping. I hope he’ll be out for a while longer⎯he was actually sleeping, not just dozing.”

“Did he wake you?”

Sarah frowned at him. “Well, of course. You were awake, too.”

“No, I mean the first time.”

Sarah’s mouth tightened. Sherlock glanced away.

“Why didn’t you wake me?” Sherlock said nothing, looking back down into the microscope.

“Look at me.” When her lover refused, Sarah’s voice steeled. “Sherlock.”

From her vantage point, the only betrayer of Sherlock’s emotions was the tighter grip he maintained on the focusing knob. She sighed and crossed the small kitchen, manoeuvering around the chairs, until she could gently rest her small fingers on Sherlock’s where they gripped the knob so tightly his knuckles stood out starkly.

“Look at me,” Sarah said, pleading, soft.

Sherlock finally leaned back away from the microscope and let his gaze skitter across hers. His eyes were bruised nearly black, red-rimmed and slightly watery, even though neither of them would ever acknowledge the last. Silently, Sarah tugged at him until he was sat facing her, and pulled him in, pressing his head to her breasts.

“I wish we could help him.”

“I don’t think we can,” Sarah said sadly.

  
John, stood in the shadows of the door, turned and padded back up the stairs as quietly as he had come down them, chest burning with shame and guilt.

  
A week later, they were in bed, Sarah tied to the headboard, writhing as Sherlock’s fingers plunged into her over and over. She was moaning nonstop, head thrashing on the pillow, tears squeezing out from her tightly clenched eyes. John’s hand on her breast slowed and then stilled as images of what she had looked like just a few scant months ago, tied to a chair, gagged, moaning roughly, weeping, blood running down her temple, hands tied behind her, Sherlock in a crumpled, unconscious heap across the room. He yanked his hands away from her body as he slammed back into the present, barely conscious of the single tear tracking its way down his face as he choked out, “Oatmeal.”

At the sound of their safeword, Sarah and Sherlock froze. John threw himself from their bed, snatching up his clothes as he muttered apologies under his breath. Their eyes tracked him as he whirled about the room.

“I’m sorry, I just, I can’t, I can’t and I’m sorry,” he said, trembling. Damned traitorous hand was making it hard to zip up his jeans.

Sherlock’s mouth opened to say something, but John fled before a syllable could slip from his lips.

John could still feel Sarah’s eyes, full of pity and confusion and concern, watching him as he clattered down the stairs and out into the cold night, breathing so deeply of the cold night air that he coughed as he started an aimless wander deep into London.

When John returned hours later, he crept up the stairs to a bed he felt he had no right to be in. Sarah was curled into Sherlock’s chest, asleep. Her long hair fanned out on the pillow and the sliver of moonlight that crept through the crack in the curtain illuminated the drying tear tracks on her cheek.

Sherlock’s eyes opened as John stepped over the threshold. His stare did not judge or deduce or accuse or hold pity⎯he merely held out one hand to John, who finally, slowly, stepped further into their room and quietly stripped down to his boxers. He stood next to the bed and hesitated, reaching down to brush his hand along the long strands of Sarah’s hair. She didn’t stir. Sherlock was still watching him, waiting.

John couldn’t meet his eyes.

He finally slid carefully under the covers, brushing aside Sarah’s hair as he pressed his forehead to the back of her head. Sherlock’s arm settled over his side, heavy and warm, an anchor John couldn’t accept. Eventually, his eyes drifted closed as he breathed in the scent of Sarah’s shampoo, and he drifted, not quite asleep.

Sherlock’s fingers brushed gently up and down John’s side as he whispered, “I wish you would let us help you, John.”

John squeezed his eyes shut and tried not to let his breathing hitch as a few tears fell without his consent, soaking into Sarah’s hair.

  
part ii


	2. Chapter 2

If you asked Sarah when this had started, when John began slipping away from them, she would say that it started about when Moriarty made his first threat against her, a month after the incident at the Pool.

  


If you asked Sherlock when he thought John started slipping away, he would tell you that it started the night of the circus, when John had to choose between saving Sarah and helping Sherlock and had been tied up, concussed, and therefore confused.

If you asked John when it started, he would tell you it started in Afghanistan. His face would close off, his eyes would shutter, and he would say no more, no matter how much you tried to pry.

 

Their relationship, this “experiment in emotional attachments among threesomes,” as Sherlock began calling it, (he later called it “my life” when asked) started, according to John and Sarah, the night of the circus. According to Sherlock, it began the day John went for his interview at the surgery, Sherlock already having claimed John for himself, even if John hadn’t realised it yet.

Sarah had shown up at Baker Street less than an hour after the police had dropped her off at her flat after John had killed Sherlock’s attacker with a spear meant for her.

“It’s too much, being alone right now,” she’d said to John, who nodded in sympathetic understanding and held the door open for her.

Sherlock’s bright eyes followed her every move until finally, finally, John said, “Let me make you up my bed, Sarah. I’ll stay here on the sofa.”

Sarah hesitated, biting her lip.

John curled one hand around her arm and smiled at her encouragingly. She nodded. John disappeared, his footfalls loud on the steps. Sarah turned and met Sherlock’s glittering eyes and refused to look away, raising her chin slightly. One corner of his mouth lifted in a smile as he went back to his mobile, fingers flying over the keys.

The almost tense silence was broken as John came back down, eyes widening as he entered the room and felt the tension simmering in the air. “Sarah?”

She jumped a bit, unable to hold John’s gaze.

“What is it?” John frowned as he looked from her to Sherlock.

Sherlock heaved a sigh. Sarah shot him a murderous glance. “Don’t⎯” she started, but Sherlock started talking.

“She feels guilty about the fact that she perceives both of us as her saviours, and has cultivated a sexual attraction to me as well as you, and is conflicted about whether or not she should pursue this, given that you and I live in each other’s pockets. But you’re a traditional man, not one to share, and she and I both know this. But neither of us want to make you choose between us, so now we seem to be at a bit of an impasse.”

John closed his eyes, swallowed hard. “You said you were married to your work.”

“I didn’t know you would stay.”

Sarah stood still in the middle of the room, hugging herself tightly. “I’m sorry, I’ll just⎯” She turned and walked straight into John, who caught her against his chest and held her close. One hand went up and combed through her hair, soothing her tremors.

“You’re in a bit of shock, still,” John murmured as he met Sherlock’s eyes over her shoulder. “We should go to bed.”

Whatever Sherlock saw in John’s face as he looked at him steadily over Sarah’s shoulder made Sherlock swallow reflexively. John steered Sarah by the shoulders out of the room.

Their footsteps were loud on the stairs as Sherlock sat in silent shock on the sofa, mobile forgotten on his lap.

The flat had long gone dark and still before Sherlock mustered the ability to move. He crept silently up the stairs to where John’s door was cracked open in an unspoken invitation. Sherlock pushed the door open and let himself watch for a moment. John and Sarah were curled up facing each other, her head tucked carefully under John’s chin. John’s back was to the wall, and his eyes were glittering slits in the moonlight as he watched Sherlock, waiting to see what he’d do next. Sherlock took a few steps into the room, quietly unbuttoning his jacket and then his shirt, discarding them on John’s chair.

Even the sounds of their breathing were suspended as Sherlock undid his trousers, leaving him standing less than a foot from the bed in just his vest and pants. John swallowed hard and held out one hand to him. Sherlock tilted his head, considering the outstretched hand, the space left on the bed, Sarah’s deep, even breaths as she slept, and, after a long second’s pause, he met John’s eyes and took his hand.

They woke the next morning in a tangle of limbs. A brief exchange of looks form John to Sherlock to Sarah led to the three of them of smiling softly, if a bit hesitantly on Sherlock’s part. John leaned down and kissed them both before pulling himself up and announcing, “I need tea,” and leaving the room, tugging on his dressing gown as he clattered down the stairs.

Sarah and Sherlock looked at each other for a moment, Sarah’s eyes scanning his face before she smiled gently and cupped one hand to his cheek, drawing him down so she could kiss him. She stood up and winked at him before she, too, went quietly downstairs. Sherlock laid back, stunned, for long moments before he finally pulled himself from the bed and joined his…partners? Friends? Not lovers, not yet, downstairs. John handed him a steaming mug and pressed a kiss to his cheek before gently guiding him to the sofa, where Sarah was already seated. She tucked her feet under Sherlock’s thighs and let the hand that wasn’t holding her own mug play with John’s fingers as they all watched the morning news.

It was almost disgustingly domestic, but that had become their morning routine for months: Sarah and John on the ends and Sherlock in the middle, as if they were afraid Sherlock would bolt if he were on the end. Even after the pool, they had sat on the sofa in the exact same way, unmoving, for hours later than normal, each of them unable to believe the others were alive.

But it wasn’t Sherlock who disrupted their routine for the first time⎯it was Sarah.

He and John had woken and instinctively reached for her, but she wasn’t there. John’s hand clutched convulsively in the empty space between them.

“Did she come home last night?” John asked.

“I don’t recall hearing her. Perhaps she stayed at her friend’s⎯”

“Julia’s”

“⎯instead of coming here if it was late.”

John was grabbing at his mobile as he clambered over Sherlock. He dialled a number Sherlock knew by heart⎯Sarah’s. The mobile was pressed hard enough to John’s ear to leech the blood from it, turning it white. Her mobile rang out, Sarah’s cheerful answerphone message tinny and flat in his ear. John rang off, and then looked helplessly at Sherlock. “I don’t know Julia’s number.”

Sherlock stood and ran down the stairs, snatching his laptop off the coffee table and opening it with one smooth flick of his wrist. “What’s her name?”

“Julia McDermott.”

Sherlock’s fingers flew over the keyboard. He turned the screen back around so John could see the page he displayed. John dialled the number and pretended his left hand wasn’t trembling slightly.

“Julia? This is John Watson. Listen, is Sarah with you?”

John’s face went white and taut with tension. “No, thank you. I will. Bye.”

John pressed the closed mobile to his lips and closed his eyes for a moment in an effort to get his breathing and his racing heart back under some semblance of control.

Sherlock was watching him intently. After a moment, John pulled the mobile away from his mouth and said, “Julia says that Sarah left the pub about 11:15 last night, said she would catch a cab. That was the last Julia saw of her.”

Sherlock nodded, and then stood up, pulling John in close. “We’ll find her. Get dressed; we’ll start with the homeless network. I’ll ring Lestrade, get some CCTV footage pulled.”

John breathed in his lover’s comforting scent and pulled back, pressing a kiss to Sherlock’s lips, lingering for a moment to draw and give comfort.

Just as they parted, Sherlock’s mobile rang.

At the sight of the number, Sherlock’s eyes widened. He pressed the speakerphone button and said, “Hello?”

“Hello boys!”

John’s eyes flew to Sherlock’s as John’s heart turned to lead. He still heard that voice in his dreams, still felt the weight of Semtex and Sherlock’s frantic gaze, and smelled the sharp tang of chlorine as he shook and Sarah and Sherlock held him, their naked skin a balm to the fear that coursed through him every time he went back to the Pool.

“Are you missing something? Or should I say, someone?”

The phone clicked off before either of them could say a word, and Sherlock’s message tone chimed. Now Sherlock’s fingers were shaking slightly as he opened the message.

He blanched and went white as he tipped the phone to John with suddenly nerveless fingers.

The photo was of Sarah’s arm and hand, bloodied and bruised. A bit of her hair was visible, but there was more blood pooled under her arm, soaking into her hair, turning it crimson.

John turned away and retched.

The phone chimed again.

 _Might want to hurry along, boys. No telling how long it’ll be before I get too bored of her being intact._

 _⎯M xx_


	3. Chapter 3

“Oh, Christ, Sherlock--”

“I know.” Sherlock’s hand locked in a iron-tight grip on John’s bicep. “John, I know. We’ll find her, and then we’ll deal with him.”

John’s eyes were unseeing, flicking back and forth as panic conjured images of soldiers broken and blasted to pieces, bleeding under his hands, images he had long tried to suppress. The stench of dust and blood and burning flesh rose up and choked him, and for one long, terrifying moment, it was Sarah lying under his hands, bleeding too quickly to stop he had no chance she wasn’t going to make it he had let her down and Sherlock would never forgive him he’d never forgive himself--

“ _John!_ ”

John’s eyes snapped to his. “Do you trust me?”

“Always.” The tension bled out of John’s shoulders bit by bit as his breathing slowed and reality rushed back in.

Sherlock dialled a number and spoke quickly to Lestrade, eyes never leaving John. The words made no sense to John--his body, once it had recovered from its initial panic, was retreating back into what Sarah jokingly called “soldier-mode.” He stood up straight, gently disentangled himself from Sherlock’s bruising grip, and went upstairs for his gun.

 

Forty minutes later, they were pacing in Lestrade’s office. They’d been through the CCTV footage of the road just outside the pub where Sarah and Julia had the night before so many times that John could see it playing every time he closed his eyes. The camera was too far away to get more than a blurred registration plate as the black car drove up. A masked man, slightly taller than Sherlock and twice as bulky, leapt out, snatched Sarah, and hauled her into the car before the door slammed shut and the car sped away. All of this took place in sixteen seconds.

That was all they had.

Sixteen seconds of footage and a blurred registration plate.

Now, they were waiting on one of the techs to get the video as clean as possible to determine the registration plate number of the car, but it was slow work and Sherlock was nearly snarling with impatience.

“We need more information,” Sherlock bit out as he stopped his frantic pacing to stare out the window.

Lestrade picked up his phone and made a call, urging the techs to hurry it up, if they didn’t mind, thank you.

John, vibrating with pent-up anger and fear, final sagged a bit and murmured something about getting them some tea. He slipped out of the room.

Sherlock, on the other hand, paid neither of them any mind. His phone had just vibrated with a text message.

 _She moans like a bitch in heat at every little thing I do to her. Did you know how beautifully she responds to pain?_

 _M_

Sherlock’s knuckles went white as he gripped the mobile even more tightly.

 _What do you want?  
SH_

The mobile buzzed again.

 _Step outside. Now.  
There’s no need to bring the puppy._

 _M_

Sherlock pushed the mobile back into his pocket, and took a final glance at Lestrade’s back. The inspector was still engrossed in his conversation with the tech. Satisfied that he wouldn’t be observed, Sherlock slid stealthily out the door and down the halls until he made it, unobserved, out to the pavement, tugging his coat closed against the sudden chill.

Just up the road a ways, not more than a block, was a black car, idling. A clear message.

Sherlock walked up to the car and opened the door, settling in on the leather seats. This car was a mockery of Mycroft’s own sedans, except there was no smirking brother or silent Anthea across from him.

He was alone.

The car accelerated smoothly, pulling into traffic. Sherlock noted their general direction and started extrapolating probable destinations based on the traffic patterns and their relative speed. Before he got more than a general impression of turning back towards the Thames, a fine mist seeped out of the vents, choking him. The last thing he tried to do before he slipped into unconsciousness was send John a text.

His fingers went nerveless before he could press send.

 

“Where’s Sherlock?” John sat the three cups of tea he’d carefully balanced the whole way down the hall back to Lestrade’s office on the inspector’s desk.

Lestrade, who still had the handset pressed to his ear, turned around and looked startled. “I thought he was with you.” He muttered something into the phone and hung up. “They’re still working on clearing up that plate, but there’s not much hope of getting much from it. It’s too blurred to clear it up much more than what they’ve got.”

John looked away, pursing his lips, straining his jaw as he fought back a dozen retorts.

“As for Sherlock—” he picked up the phone again and asked a few questions of whoever was on the other end. He set the receiver down with a heavy click. “Desk sergeants saw him go out the front door about five minutes ago.”

“Do you have cameras there?”

Lestrade tapped a few keys. “Here.”

John came around the desk and leaned in closer. There was Sherlock, pausing for just a moment, pulling his coat around himself as he glanced up and down the street before heading off to his right. He disappeared from view and John swore.

“Can you get a better view of where he went?”

Lestrade pressed a few more keys, and the view changed to a different camera. “This is the best we’ve got.”

Sherlock reappeared and stepped into an idling black sedan, registration plate clearly visible. John sagged a bit in relief. “I’d bet that was one of Mycroft’s cars,” he said.

“The plate’s a government one,” Lestrade murmured as they watched the car pull away from the kerb and slip into traffic.

“But why wouldn’t he have waited? Sherlock wouldn’t have rung Mycroft on his own, not so early in a case. And he would’ve waited for me in any case.”

John’s mobile beeped, making them both jump. “Shit! The surgery—I’ve got a shift—I can’t miss it. Sarah would—” He cut himself off and swallowed.

“Go,” Lestrade said gently, reading the conflicting emotions on John’s face. “We’ll keep an eye out for Sherlock and I’ll let you know the second we know anything about either of them.”

“Right,” John said, tapping his mobile against his palm.

“We’ll give Sherlock a bollocking for leaving without telling us, yeah?” Lestrade added as he gently steered John out the door. “We’ll find them.”

“I know.”

 

Three and a half hours passed before John’s mobile buzzed. Unknown number. He closed his door, rang the receptionist not to send anyone back for a few minutes, and opened the text.

He leapt to his feet so quickly he knocked his chair over.

The bastard had them both. Sherlock’s eyes were closed, blood running down one cheek from a gash at his temple. Sarah’s body was slumped against his, Sherlock’s arm tight around her. Her eyes were closed, too, face clenched tight with pain. John could see the odd angle of her arm, knew it was broken. Bile rose in the back of his throat; he pushed it back down, eyes scanning the background of the tiny image for any clue as to their whereabouts. There wasn’t much to go on—concrete walls, artificial lights. A basement, somewhere, probably, but where?

The mobile rang. John stabbed the answer button, pressing the phone to his ear, saying nothing.

Moriarty’s voice bounced into his ear. “Hello, puppy! I’ve got a treat for you, yes I do. I have some things that you think belong to you.”

John heard Sherlock start to shout his name. There was a grunt and a wet slap, and Sherlock fell silent again.

“Leave them alone,” John bit out, hand clenching in a fist.

“Oooh, puppy has some bite to him!” Moriarty squealed. “Since you amuse me, puppy, and I’m ever so dreadfully bored, I’ll let you play. Would you like that?”

“I will kill you,” John said calmly.

“Tsk tsk, such empty threats. Here’s the game. I’ll send you pictures of your lovely little friends, you figure out where we are, and I won’t kill them. Simple enough, right? But there’s a catch. I know you’re slower than our good detective here, so I’ll give you one hour before I make you choose who I hurt and what I do to them.”

John closed his eyes.

“Now, the game’s already started, so I won’t make you choose just yet. Get whatever help you need, puppy, I don’t expect you to win this little game. I’lll give you twelve hours, and then I’ll start sending you pieces in the post. Perhaps I’ll start with Sherlock’s pretty eyes. Wouldn’t they be so nice preserved in a jar?”

“Don’t touch him,” Sarah hissed, causing John’s eyes to fly open.

Moriarty laughed. “Oh, she’s a feisty one! We’ll have so much fun today, won’t we, pet?”

John inhaled, but before he could speak, Moriarty’s voice was back, hard and cold. “One hour, puppy.”

The line went dead.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> New warning: graphic depiction of torture.

Time seemed to pass in the blink of an eye.

John blinked, and he was in Lestrade’s office again, his mobile in the inspector’s hand. Lestrade bit the inside of his lip and said, “Not much to to go on, the bastard. He’s good.”

“It’s got to be somewhere with no windows; there’s no natural light in there. So either a basement or an interior room somewhere. Likely an abandoned building. But that’s all I can get from the picture.”

Lestrade looked at him with a hint of admiration in his steady, calming gaze. “I know this is the wrong time to say this, but it looks like he’s rubbing off on you.”

John glared at him as he accepted his mobile back. “I have thirty-five minutes before that bastard calls again, and I want to have a good lead on where he’s got them by then. I have to find them, Lestrade, and I have to find them quickly before he--”

“Before he what?”

“Before he sends them to me in pieces.”

“Jesus Christ.” Lestrade sank down in his chair and covered his eyes for a moment before scrubbing his hand over his face and meeting John’s eyes. “Right. Let me get that photo sent around, see if anyone can recognise where they are.”

Just as John handed his mobile back over, it chimed. New email. With a flick of his eyes for permission, Lestrade opened it. “It’s a link,” he said, typing it into his computer. John stood and went around the desk to watch over Lestrade’s shoulder. The site was black, but as they watched, it suddenly flashed into life as a black and white image flickered into being. Lestrade instantly pressed a few keys as the image solidified. “It’s a recording program,” he told John. “I can make sure we have a copy of whatever this is.”

They both inhaled sharply. Sherlock and Sarah were strapped down on two separate tables, stripped naked and blindfolded and gagged. Sarah was still; Sherlock was pulling at his bonds. John’s eyes hardened as Moriarty stepped into view.

“That’s him. Moriarty.” John said through clenched teeth.

“Hello, puppy! Thought I’d give you and the good DI a little preview of what’s to come. After all, anticipation makes everything sweeter, don’t you think?” He gestured over his shoulder and there was a scraping noise as a third table was dragged into view. Lestrade huffed out a shocked breath as he took in the instruments laid out in precise rows on it. John tried not to see, not to let himself imagine what could be done with the various scalpels, knives, electrodes, the axe _oh dear God_ , the mallets and bottles of unidentified fluids that sat there, burning themselves into his corneas.

John swallowed thickly, knuckles going white where they gripped the back of Lestrade’s chair. He had seen things just as bad in Afghanistan, but these tools looked somewhat more menacing in their pristine condition. The harsh lighting shone on the blades and John’s stomach rolled.

“Now do you see?” Moriarty asked, smile a rictus of glee and anticipation. “Do you see what you’ll have to choose? Best be thinking about it, puppy. I’ll see you soon. Ciao!”

The screen went dark again.

Lestrade looked at John, whose eyes were hard and dangerous. “John—”

“I need to make a call,” John said tightly. “And then I’ll be back. I want everything you and your team can give me. I know I shouldn’t ask that of you, but…”

“Stop right there. There is very little my team or I would not do for either of you. You’re a part of this team, John, you and Sherlock both.”

John nodded, jaw tight. “Thank you,” he whispered.

Lestrade gave a small nod in return and strode out of his office, shouting for Sally and the rest of his team. John snuck out, unnoticed, and went outside, standing in full view of one of the Yard’s CCTV cameras. He pulled out his mobile and, staring straight into the camera, dialled a number he had made Sherlock give him after the incident at the pool.

Mycroft answered on the second ring.

John didn’t even let him finish his greeting before he was talking so quickly only a Holmes could have got half of what he was saying. “Sherlock and Sarah were kidnapped by Moriarty; Sarah after 11 PM last night and Sherlock just over an hour ago.”

“What do you have?”

“A few texts and a video.”

“I take it Inspector Lestrade is assisting?”

“Yes, and it will stay that way.”

“Very well. Stay there. I will be there in ten minutes for a briefing. I need to know and see everything you have, Doctor Watson.” The line went dead, and John went back inside, heading straight for the toilets. He went in, shut and locked the door, and allowed himself one minute to fall apart and another minute to gather himself before heading back to Lestrade’s office.

He opened the door and walked onto the floor, which immediately went into chaos.

“He just sent another link, this time to my email,” Lestrade said as he grabbed John’s elbow and all but dragged him to the nearest computer. “We’ve not opened it yet—we were waiting on you to come back.”

“Mycroft will be here in less than ten minutes,” John said, sitting down heavily in the desk chair. The screen in front of him had the same ominous black background as the video feed had. The cursor blinked next to the web address. John took a deep breath and pressed enter.

A single message floated into view.

 _I got bored, sorry._

:)  


The message disappeared, and a single still image replaced it.

John’s eyes closed for just an instant before he forced them back open, desperate to get a clue, any clue of where they might be held.

Several of the police officers ran from the room, but even the thick walls couldn’t keep out the sound of their vomiting in the hall.

Lestrade looked away from the screen, huffed a breath or two, and looked back, resolutely keeping his eyes off the image on the screen to press a few buttons to take a screencap.

Mycroft walked into the room at that moment, unruffled and smooth, umbrella hanging from his arm. He caught sight of what was on the screen and blanched.

“Is that—”

For the first time since they’d met, John heard Mycroft fail to complete a sentence. “It is,” John said gently, so gently, a core of steel behind his voice that said, _don’t you dare look away he needs you she needs you I need you and you need to see so you will_ fight _with everything you have in your power to take this sick bastard down._

Mycroft didn’t look away.

The image disappeared and was replaced with a new message.

 _Fifteen minutes, puppy. Better be thinking about what you’d like to happen._

:D

Mycroft pulled out his mobile and spoke into it, ordering whomever it was on the other end to trace the address of that site and triangulate the texts John had on his mobile.

“You have fifteen minutes to report, and I want to have something before then. Every moment counts, is that clear? Good.” Mycroft rang off and looked at John and Lestrade. “Tell me everything.”

And so they did.

Precisely fifteen minutes after Moriarty’s last message, John’s mobile buzzed again with a new email and a new website address.

Lestrade typed it into the computer, and they all crowded around waiting for the site to load.

Moriarty’s grinning face appeared as he stood between Sherlock and Sarah, practically vibrating with glee.

“Hello, puppy and his little friends! I know the Yard has a microphone, go get one, there’s a good inspector. Go on, I’ll wait.”

Lestrade motioned to one of his sergeants, who returned moments later with a mic that he plugged in.

Mycroft immediately started speaking the second the mic was turned on. “Release my brother and Doctor Sawyer and there—”

“Oh no, no, no, no!” Moriarty sang. “No one but our dear Doctor Watson gets to speak to me.” Moriarty dug his fingers into Sherlock’s back and drug them downwards. “Oooh, scalpels are so much fun! Did you have as much fun when you could still operate, Doctor?”

John’s fingers clenched on the edge of the desk. “Leave him alone. Leave her alone. If it’s me you want, then it’s me you’ll get. What do you want?”

“I want you to make a choice, Doctor, of who lives and who dies. Not yet, obviously, have to get a little fun out of this, but soon. But for now, you get to decide who gets to have their foot broken. Every bone.” Moriarty picked up the mallet and hefted it, pondering its weight. “I’ll even let you choose which foot. But don’t think you’ll get to make too many more decisions like that. I’m feeling generous since it;s your first time.”

John lowered his head. Sherlock needed to run after criminals, but Sarah, oh god, _Sarah_. He’d never be able to look either of them in the eye after this. How do you make a choice like this?

“Clock’s ticking, puppy!”

“Sarah. Oh God, Sarah, I’m sorry, I can’t, I don’t, Oh God forgive me—”

Moriarty swung the mallet down on Sarah’s right foot. The crunch was audible, but John forced his eyes to stay open. Her screams were high and thin as the dull thud of the mallet sounded again and again. Sherlock’s hands were clenching and unclenching helplessly.

When he was done, Moriarty turned back to the camera. “The only words I want to hear from you, Doctor, are the answers to my questions. Or I won’t give you a choice anymore.”

He looked over his shoulder at Sarah, whose face was streaked with the tears that had leaked under her blindfold. “One hour, puppy.”

The screen went dark.


	5. Chapter 5

As soon as the screen blanked out, John buried his face in his hands and took four long, deep, steadying breaths. His hands didn’t quiver at all.

Lestrade, in turn, had started barking orders to his team, who scattered like the wind as soon as the words left his mouth.

Mycroft simply breathed out in a soft sigh and opened his mobile. With a glance at John, he waited until the person on the other end picked up, and then said in a perfectly calm voice, “Status report.”

Mycroft frowned at the response. “Unacceptable. I need his location now. There are lives at stake here.”

More silence. John and Lestrade were watching him now. “I am aware that Sherlock takes great pains to disable the tracking devices I plant on him and on Doctors Sawyer and Watson. I am certain he does not have one currently online, and neither does Doctor Sawyer. Am I correct? That’s what I thought. Now, has anyone thought to trace the device we planted on Mr. Moriarty’s person when he was still in our custody?”

John’s eyes widened. “Tracking device?” he mouthed at Mycroft.

Mycroft’s nostrils flared, “And why are they not working?”

Pause.

“I suggest you find a solution, Henderson, before I ring back in ten minutes. Understood?” Mycroft pushed the off button with a vicious stab and looked back at John. “When Mr. Moriarty was…in our custody, I took the liberty of having some tracking devices planted on him. While some of them were more obvious than others, in the hope that in finding them he would not look deeper for more, it seems that there has been a malfunction with the one that should have been foolproof. It is highly unlikely that he has found it and disabled it on purpose⎯it’s more likely that some of the equipment in that room is causing some interference. I have people working on tracking him by tracing the very few things that could possibly interfere with the device.”

“And what happens if they can’t find anything?” Lestrade asked.

Mycroft’s expression turned grim. “Then we hope that he leaves long enough to enable the device to put out a signal.”

 

An agonising two and a half hours later, John’s knuckles were raw and red from where he had punched Lestrade’s (thankfully) sturdy desk in rage. There had been electrodes, and knives, and Sherlock’s arm…and Sarah’s back, and it was obvious Moriarty had been “playing” as he called it in between his calls to John.

“I can’t do this anymore,” John said after the last text, which detailed the amount of cocaine Sarah had just been administered. ( _So she’ll know how Sherlock felt. Do you think she’ll handle the dose he used to take? ⎯M xoxo_ ). “I can’t sit back and keep playing this sick game. I need to be _doing_ something, not just sitting here while the two people I love are being…mutilated.”

“You’re keeping him sane, John,” Mycroft said. “You’re keeping him distracted, and if he’s distracted, then perhaps he will make a mistake. He needs an audience, and without it, I am afraid to even think of what he might do to them.”

Abruptly, the computer screen flicked back into life, revealing Moriarty holding a long, wicked-looking knife. “Hellooo!” he cried, waving the knife in a grotesque arc. “Time to play a new game, puppy. I’ve always wanted to see what a human body looks like on the inside when it’s still alive and twitching. So, I’ll give you some time to think so I can pick your brain. You used to be a surgeon, after all, and I want your best game. Who should I cut open? Keep in mind, I’ll be making you tell me where to cut, or else I might just slip up and slit open some vital organ.”

John went white, and then green. Mycroft swallowed thickly, a faint noise of disgust escaping him. Lestrade gripped John’s shoulder so tightly that his knuckles stood out from his skin.

“I’ll give you one minute, little puppy, and then we’ll begin.”

A new figure stepped into the camera’s view and leaned in close to whisper something into Moriarty’s ear. He turned to face the camera with a wicked half-smile. “Looks like you just got lucky, my dear. Must go and answer a call⎯business is still going on as usual. I’ll make it quick though⎯I don’t want the suspense to kill you.”

Moriarty’s departure was marked with a grotesque parody of Sherlock’s favourite coat-twirl. Just as John was opening his mouth to shout reassurances to his lovers, the camera feed went out.

Mycroft’s mobile rang within seconds of the screen going dark. “Did you get a signal?” he asked without preamble.

There was a pause, and then Mycroft’s smile turned positively shark-like. “Send in the team. We’ll be there in seven minutes.”

John sputtered, “Seven minutes? This whole time, they were only seven minutes away? Jesus!” he spat.

“Seven minutes’ drive, Doctor,” Mycroft said gently as he walked out the door, Lestrade and John at his heels. Once they were outside, he ushered them into a waiting car, which sped away, managing to miss every red light along the way.

John’s fingers were drumming endlessly on his thighs, which were also bouncing nervously as he stared out the window at the buildings that flashed by. Any one of these anonymous buildings could hold the two people he held most dear. He had been so close to them this whole time⎯he should have been out here, looking for them instead of sitting in front of a computer screen, a little puppet waiting to play that bastard’s sick game. Mycroft, without looking over at him, said quietly, “As ever, Doctor Watson, you could not have done anything differently. There is nothing for you to feel guilty about. None of this was your fault.”

“How can you not hate me?”

That made Lestrade gasp and Mycroft look askance at him.

“I was the one who made the choice, I was the one who hurt your brother. He did what I told him to do⎯it _was_ me, Mycroft. It was my fault.”

“John⎯” Mycroft began, “John, look at me, please. I am not angry at you. You did what you had to do to keep him and Doctor Sawyer alive. If you had not, we would be getting them back in pieces. I have no doubt that he would have carried through with his plan if you had not been the epitome of the courageous soldier in these past few hours. How could I be angry with you when your actions kept my brother alive?”

John looked away and clenched his hands into fists. He hadn’t been brave. He had caused his lovers pain and suffering, and he would hear their screams for the rest of his life. There would be no end to the guilt, the nightmares. Sherlock and Sarah would never be able to look at him again. Why would they, when he was the one who gave them scars they would never be able to ignore?

 

The building the car stopped in front of was one that was utterly unremarkable, but John would never be able to forget even the smallest of cracks in the brickwork. As soon as the car door opened, John rushed out, ready to break in to the building himself and rescue his lovers. Mycroft’s steely grip on his arm caught him. “Wait,” he said, “they’re bringing them out in a moment.”

A flurry of activity near the doorway caught John’s eye as two stretchers were wheeled in, swallowed up in the darkness beyond the door. John counted his heartbeats until finally, finally, 780 beats later, the stretchers reappeared.

The medics assigned to Mycroft’s team paused for just a moment to let him grasp at Sherlock’s limp hand, press a kiss to his clammy forehead before he turned to Sarah and ran a trembling hand through her tangled, blood-soaked hair, kissing her gently.

“We gave them morphine, sir,” one of the medics said as John’s eyes flicked over both of his partners’ faces, cataloguing each bruise, laceration, each drop of blood that dried into a dull red.

“Sir?” John blinked and met the medic’s eyes. “We need to take them to hospital. You’re to ride in the ambulance with Doctor Sawyer. Mr. Holmes will accompany his brother. The Inspector will meet us there.”

John nodded and reluctantly let his hand slip from Sherlock’s. The stretchers were loaded, John settled into the back next to Sarah, holding her hand gently, so gently, as to not cause any further pain.

He only let go once they opened the ambulance doors and took her away from him again.


	6. Chapter 6

It had been four months since Sherlock and Sarah had been released from hospital. It had been four months since John slept through the night. Every time he dropped off, he jerked himself awake again, listening intently for their shared breaths, to feel the weight of Sarah’s arm across his hip, to hear Sherlock’s heat beating against his back. The cycle of barely closing his eyes and snapping them open would last until his body decided to give up its fight and overrode his instinct to _stay awake, to protect and guard_ against anything and anyone that might attempt to steal his lovers from him again.

Where Sherlock and Sarah, albeit with new scars (John had averted his eyes from those still too-fresh scars for weeks until one day, he steeled himself and gently, so gently traced the ones that trailed down Sherlock’s back and Sarah’s arm. His hand hadn’t trembled a bit), had gained their weight back from their extended hospital stays and the colour had returned to their cheeks after long weeks of hospitalization and horrific dreams that were only just starting to fade, John himself had lost weight. He looked smaller and sunken, eyes dark and shoulders hunched. He looked like an animal whose mate had been threatened, but there was no way to counteract the aggressor. 

(“He’s not a threat anymore, John,” Mycroft had said at the hospital once Sherlock and Sarah had been taken back to be examined. John had seen the two rape kits that a nurse carried back to them and nearly vomited⎯thank God for small mercies that both tests had been negative⎯but Mycroft’s eyes were steady on his, and that gave him back some of his equilibrium.

“I want to see him,” John muttered. “I want to rip his heart from his chest and let him hear himself beg for mercy.”

Mycroft didn’t blink. “I’m afraid that is not possible. Mr. Moriarty and his…compatriots are no longer a threat.”

John still didn’t know if that meant Moriarty was dead or simply being held in a prison and having an exceedingly unpleasant time there. A small part of him, one he kept carefully hidden, hoped it was the latter.)

 

They still slept in the same bed, curled around each other until there was hardly any space between them. John felt better if he was in the middle where he could see and hear and feel both of them clearly as he hadn’t been able to then, and Sherlock and Sarah obliged him, wrapping him in close and breathing just loudly enough to be heard the whole night through, even if John did manage to drop off and sleep for a few hours. 

One morning, John heard Sherlock and Sarah whispering about him, about wanting to help him, and the guilt burned his chest and throat. He didn’t deserve their help or their pity. He kept flashing back to Sherlock’s screams, Sarah’s muffled cries and bloody arms. At one point, Moriarty had taken Sherlock off the table and tied Sarah into a chair (he later found that Sarah’s back had been burnt and she had been tied, cruelly, so tightly to the chair that her flesh had been stuck to it) and left Sherlock in a heap on the floor, bleeding profusely. Somehow, that one image was almost worse than anything else he had seen during that whole long ordeal, and that was the one he saw most often every time he closed his eyes. 

And then he had run out on Sarah and Sherlock in the middle of sex, and had crept back into their bed hours later, after he’d been out on a walk that took him through half of London, it seemed, but the guilt and shame was still there, burning a hole in his heart.

It hurt.

When he had come in, quietly so as not to wake them, Sherlock’s eyes met his in the darkness. John swallowed hard and crawled back into bed, breathing in Sarah’s scent and taking comfort he didn’t deserve from Sherlock’s gentle caress.

“I wish you would let us help you, John,” Sherlock murmured.

John squeezed his eyes shut and prayed that sleep would take him so he didn’t have to accept Sherlock’s pity. He didn’t deserve it.

 

The next morning, John awoke and the bed was empty. He sat straight up in a panic, heart pounding as he strained his ears for any sign his lovers were in the flat. 

There was nothing. No sounds, no quiet murmurs, nothing.

John threw himself out of bed and clattered down the stairs, chest heaving. He burst into the sitting room, wild-eyed and breathing hard, startling both Sherlock and Sarah, who were sitting on the sofa, Sarah’s feet tucked under Sherlock’s thighs.

“John?” she asked, untangling her feet and rising, hurrying across the room to him as he slumped against the door frame, struggling to get his breathing under control.

She crouched down with him, catching at his hands as he tugged them through his hair. “What is it? What’s happened?”

Sherlock dropped down on his haunches and covered John’s knee with one hand, ducking down a bit to get a good look at John’s face, which was currently tucked down into his chest as his lungs worked and his face contorted in an effort to keep himself calm. 

“John, it’s all right,” Sherlock soothed, gently rubbing his thumb along the bony outer ridge of John’s patella. 

“No it’s not!” John spat, exploding to his feet in a rush that nearly knocked his partners over. They stared at him, speechless, as he paced in a tight, barely controlled line back and forth across the sitting room floor. “Just say it!”

Sarah and Sherlock exchanged a worried glance. 

“Say what, John?” Sarah asked.

“That you hate me. That you despise the very fact that I exist. That you never want to see me again, and that you’d be better off without me. You don’t need me anymore. You don’t love me. How could you?”

Sarah’s cheeks burned with her rising anger. As she opened her mouth to retort, Sherlock held her back with a hand to her forearm. 

Sherlock’s eyes flicked up and down, scanning and cataloguing and weighing and judging before he whispered, “Ah.”

That small utterance stopped John in his tracks. He stared at the two of them, Sarah breathing hard, her chest rising and falling rapidly as her jaw worked. Sherlock was still as marble, his hand still resting gently on Sarah’s arm. Sherlock’s breaths were so shallow that his chest did not move, and it made John think of him lying on that table, bound and helpless and barely breathing and then his breath broke on a sob. John pressed the back of one trembling hand to his mouth, desperately trying to contain the howl that wanted to escape him. 

“Survivor’s guilt,” Sherlock pronounced, emphasising the final “t” with a finality that sounded like a death knell.

John wouldn’t meet his eyes.

“You feel guilty because you were the one left unhurt. There are no scars, no physical reminders on your body. You were spared our ordeal and you feel guilty because of it. The shame of being left behind, of not being able to share the burden. It’s been eating at you, hasn’t it? Oh, John…” Sherlock trailed off, glancing at Sarah, whose eyes had widened and softened at Sherlock’s diagnosis. “You think you don’t deserve to be loved, that we would be better off without you, simply because you think nothing happened to you. But something did happen, didn’t it?”

John took a deep, shuddering breath. He had sworn Mycroft and Lestrade to secrecy when Sarah and Sherlock had been in hospital. He didn’t know how much they remembered, how much they could hear when Moriarty…had them, and he was determined to protect them from that knowledge for as long as possible. 

“What else did he say to you, John?” Sarah asked, her voice quiet. “I know he said he would send us to you in pieces, I remember that much.”

John blanched.

“What else did he say?” Sherlock, now, his voice insistent.

“He⎯he made me choose. I had to choose who got hurt. And if I refused, he’d choose and do something worse. It was my decision, and my fault.”

Sherlock and Sarah reached for him at the same time, and he shied away as if their very touch was painful.

But now that the floodgate had opened, John found himself admitting the one thing he had sworn never to tell them. “He wanted me to help him cut one of you open. He wanted me to choose one of you and then he wanted me to guide him through a live autopsy and…”

“Who did you choose?” That was Sherlock, quiet and matter-of-fact, as if he was asking what brand of tea John preferred.

“I didn’t. He got a call, and stepped outside the room and that reactivated the tracking device. Mycroft’s team got to you before he did.”

An uncomfortable silence settled over the flat. The three of them were sitting apart, not touching, John further away. 

Sherlock broke the silence. “You can’t tell us how to feel, John.”

John stirred, ready to retort, but Sherlock headed him off.

“You can’t,” he repeated firmly. “And blaming yourself is irrational. Your choices had no real weight in the situation⎯he was doing whatever he liked to both of us in between his calls to you. Therefore, you did nothing wrong.”

“But I didn’t save you. It’s my job to keep you both safe, and I failed at that. My God, the two of you bear the scars of my failure, and you tell me that that’s not my fault? Of course I did something wrong⎯I failed you both and I have no right to ask you to stay. In fact, I’d be surprised if you did stay with someone who can’t even protect you and has done nothing but cause you pain.”

Sarah’s sudden grip was like steel. He hadn’t even heard her move. He gasped, startled, and his eyes met and were locked with Sherlock’s. John was trapped between Sarah’s strong grip and Sherlock’s penetrating gaze: he panted and gasped for breath, the intensity of their feelings sucked the air from the room.

“John Hamish Watson, if I ever again hear you say or imply that you do not deserve us, or that you’ve failed us in some way, I will not be held responsible for my actions.” Her voice was low and confident, and he felt it breaking apart his foundations. 

Sherlock stood and sat down next to him, pulling him and Sarah in tightly. “I have found you both, and I am not giving you up so easily. You both are _mine_ and I am _yours_ and there is nothing that will tear me away from you, or us from you. Nothing. Do you understand?”

“Let it out, John,” Sarah murmured. “No more guilt. No more running away from us. Let it go. We don’t hate you; we don’t blame you. None of this was your fault. In fact, Mycroft told us that if you hadn’t gone along with that bastard’s plan, we wouldn’t be sitting here now. So you saved us, John, and you need to start believing it. Don’t let him win. Don’t let him destroy us and you.”

John shook and felt his foundations, the very core of himself shatter and then slowly, painstakingly, begin to rebuild themselves into something stronger than before. He pressed his damp face hard into Sherlock’s shoulder and let himself go, finally allowing himself to feel secure in the knowledge that as long as he needed them, they would hold him and support him. 

They sat like that until Sarah’s legs cramped and John’s back spasmed. Slowly, carefully, as if they were coming out of a deep hypnosis, they stood, John’s legs as shaky as a newborn colt.

“Bed,” Sherlock said, gently steering them up the stairs, supporting John’s weight.

Once there, they slowly divested each other of their clothing and slid naked into bed, John in the middle, lying on his back, cradled on each side. Sarah’s hand stroked gently through his hair as she pressed the occasional soft kiss to his temple or cheek. Sherlock rubbed slow circles over his abdomen, and slowly, John felt the tension and guilt and fear he had let build up ever since that awful day start to bleed away.

“Better?” Sherlock queried, just as John’s breathing slowed and evened out as he began to drift away.

“It will be,” John replied, kissing both of them softly.

“It will be,” he repeated as he closed his eyes and slept without dreams for the first time in months.

⎯Fin⎯


End file.
